2nd
Lectionary Reflections and Study for July 6th, 2008
Hebrew Scripture Lessons (Genesis 24:34-38, 42-49, 58-67 with Song of Solomon 2:8-13)
If these last few weeks’ lessons with their stories of foible Abraham and his folks has challenged us to see both world and God in shades of grey, this week’s Hebrew Scripture lessons call us to color in this portrait with pastels. In Genesis 24, Sarah is dead and Abraham seeks to know his lineage (and God’s covenant) will be continued. His trusted, nameless steward is sent to find an appropriate, non-Canaanite wife for Isaac. Unlike the previous stories, God is only mentioned and God’s voice is absent. Rebekah is found at a well, her brother Laban offers his consent and she travels back with the caravan to wed the stranger Isaac. This could be described in purely legal terms, but instead Rebekah is portrayed as a beautiful and generous person. She seems to be honestly, even romatically, taken by Isaac’s first appearance. Oedipal as it may seem, the marriage is consummated in Isaac’s mother’s tent.
Sex is good. Or so the author of Song of Solomon would have us believe. It’s summertime and love is in the air for all the men young enough to still move like stags and gazelles, and the women who want to be with them (and vice versa). Jews have said this erotic poem is nothing more than the song shared by God and Israel, for Christians this has been the song of Christ and his Church (Mary has also fit in there somewhere.) But this poem celebrates love, a gauzy, Zefirelli’s “Romeo and Juliet” kind of physical love. Can we as a church—and as preachers—celebrate that human sexuality is a gift from God?
The Psalm is a rare one: a courtly wedding poem. It’s patriarchy with a little monarchy mixed in. At least it’s kind of sensual.
Epistle Lesson (Romans 7:15-25a)
I’d argue that this is St. Paul at his most honest. Of course, if we universalize it we have the total dissolution of the Song of Solomon and maybe the Gospel lesson as well, but why do we liberals look at Paul and dismiss his truth because it is not universal, when we’d never expect the same from ourselves? Paul is on the offensive with those who would claim the “law” as God’s final word. Paul seems to be comparing Old Testament law to natural law—before the concept had been developed. Paul’s experience of his flesh being at war with his mind/will and God’s law/will has put Christianity in a difficult spot over the last two millennia. A dualism based largely in neo-platonism is the hallmark of Paul’s understanding of the practice of Christianity (and therefore ours also.) My own congregation was most publicly caught up in this debate in the 1880 controversy of croquet vs. dancing (http://query.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=9F0CE4D81E31EE3ABC4E52DFB466838B699FDE), but this is hardly a conundrum solved by post-Victorian Christians. Here’s the question for us as 21st century Methodists: how can we deal with Paul’s honesty about doing what he knows he should not, without calling our congregants’ free will sinful?
Gospel Lesson (Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30 )
This passage begins with Jesus comparing the response John the Baptist got to the response he is getting. These folks can’t decide if they want a wedding or a funeral. John was too austere, while Jesus is accused of being a lush. Neither really fit the bill of being the organ grinder’s monkey. Jesus continues by saying, “Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds.” Craddock, et al, point out that this echoes the phrase, “A good tree does not bear bad fruit” (Luke 6:44). This verse also introduces a rare foray into wisdom literature for this synoptic Gospel; what follows seems more at home with John’s Gospel than Matthew’s (here “Sofia” becomes the feminine equivalent of “logos”). Jesus teaches in this passage that seeing the truth comes not from experience or intelligence, as we are often taught; instead wisdom is discovered by infants. If these past weeks’ Gospel lessons have spelled out the perils of discipleship, this passage ends in the comforting words that being yoked is Christ is easy. In the enterprise of following Christ we find some rest… this may be contrasted with our concept and expectations of vacation. Truth is that the Jesus burden is heavier than the burdens we carry daily, he just takes most of the weight for himself.
I think the whole Gospel lesson finds its counterpoint in the hymn, “Lord of the Dance:”
I danced in the morning when the world was begun,
And I danced in the moon and the stars and the sun,
And I came down from heaven and I danced on the earth,
At Bethlehem I had my birth.
Refrain
Dance, then, wherever you may be; I am the Lord of the Dance, said he.
And I’ll lead you all wherever you may be, And I’ll lead you all in the dance, said he.
I danced for the scribe and the Pharisee,
But they would not dance and they would not follow me;
I danced for the fishermen, for James and John;
They came to me and the dance went on.
Refrain
I danced on the sabbath when I cured the lame, The holy people said it was a shame;
They whipped and they stripped and they hung me high; And they left me there on a cross to die.
Refrain
I danced on a Friday and the sky turned black; It’s hard to dance with the devil on your back;
They buried my body and they thought I’d gone, But I am the dance and I still go on.
Refrain
They cut me down and I leapt up high, I am the life that’ll never, never die;
I’ll live in you if you’ll live in me; I am the Lord of the Dance, said he.
Refrain
For a great discussion of these passages for the highly successful, consider this link http://www.sarahlaughed.net/lectionary/2005/06/index.html.
